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What to Do if You Fall on a Public Sidewalk

What to Do if You Fall on a Public Sidewalk

VIDEO TRANSCRIPTION:

The first thing to do, if you’re able to get up, is take a picture of the scene. You want to preserve that information for later on. People are going to be interested in what caused you to fall. That condition could change over time, so it’s important to document it at that point. Seek medical attention for any injuries that you have. You’re going to want to report it to the property owner. A lot of times you’re not going to know who owns a certain sidewalk. You may have to have your attorney’s office do an investigation and find out who the legal property owner is so that we would provide them notice.

It depends. If it’s a commercial property, then the business is responsible for it. Residential, you can actually have a situation where no one’s responsible for people tripping on cracks, things like that, unless you can prove it’s an obvious dangerous condition that they knew about, but it’s less onerous responsibility on the homeowner than it would be a business. The reasons are obvious because businesses are inviting people to come to their property so that they can make money, and therefore, they have a higher duty under the law to keep a safe premises.